Two players; we'll call them A and B. Both are new to TTRPGs.
Having some difficulty trying to connect with Player A. I'll try to keep things short, but I want to try to get all the context there too.
He is not a power gamer in the TTRPG traditional sense, but comes from a background of ONLY video games. As such his whole motivation in many of those games were to spend hours on end grinding to be as strong as possible and picking up all the loot he could find to equip the best stuff all the time. This shows in his approach to DnD.
Every town and every dungeon he tries to find something that's 1d12 damage and not 1d8, 1 more AC than before, 1 more STR than before, and so on. Non-numerical power is hard to parse for him; things must hit harder than before or block more than before or he isn't getting stronger.
His backstory left me with little to nothing as it was 'kicked out of his house because he spent all day training and fantasizing about weapons in his room'. He made a Fighter and the race he chose has some spell features (it's a supplement; Beast World; he picked Jackal and it comes with Eldritch Blast), but every level he has sunk into STR and DEX; no feats. He doesn't like that his Eldritch Blast is weaker than his attacks, but doesn't want to sacrifice his strength with weapons. He wants a two hand sword because it deals more damage, but doesn't want to lose the AC his shield gives him.
And he's not confrontational or demanding about it; that's the part I want to stress. In fact he's always worried about being 'too OP'. Case in point he asked me today if there were spells he could add to his weapon or turn based effects that affected time like Haste, Stop, gravity spells, etc. so it wasn't all about damage, but, as DMs know, the most powerful effects in the game are ones that adjust any form of Action Economy and so in vanilla, and many supplements, these things are limited or outright banned.
I'm just at a complete loss on how to navigate this. Player B wants social interaction, wants to explore, and wants more than just combat. Player A only values combat and every other situation is just a road to fighting things. Dialogue he'll engage with minimally and won't sabotage, but if this were a single player game dude would be skipping these parts for the next fight for sure, lol.
I tried to talk with him about his character's motivation for doing things, for adventuring, etc. to try to get an idea of how to invest him more into the world and he said plain as day his character just wants to get stronger and fight the 'final boss', lol. And this 'final boss' is in his head, because I have never hinted at, revealed, or created a BBEG for this campaign. They've been going on episodic adventure style quests up to this point (and they were informed of this at the start) and looking at their actions and successes and failures to come up with a BBEG organically if needed.
Sounds like just needing to balance potions of the game to cater to the needs for your players. Player A is a numbers guy who values combat. His character reflects that by being something of your average fighting anime protagonist. Give him something to fight and he will be happy. Give him something to chase or strive for, and he'll be happy. Player B is more story driven. Use the story and the social aspect of the game to let Player B unlock lore and fun bits that lead Player A to their goal of fighting or gathering power.
I guess the question is, if there is no big bad, what is the main thrust of your campaign? It may be that the free-form directionless feel of it all is causing some distress in Player A. They are looking for a challenge and only finding more social encounters to overcome.
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"The mongoose blew out its candle and was asleep in bed before the room went dark." —Llanowar fable
I would just explain that D&D is not a video game, even though there are video games based on D&D. He doesn't have to worry about being OP. You, the DM, can balance combat as needed... and that includes some things that are so much tougher than his character could ever be that a Dark Souls boss would feel sorry for him if they were thrown in.
Ask him if he has anything specifically in mind for what his character would think of as a "final boss". Or anything in general. Would it be a dragon? Would it be a dragon that did a specific thing?
Sounds like his character is on the Goku arc. His only goal is to get stronger and fight stronger enemies so he can get stronger.
It might help to explain to him that 5e essentially has caps on how high the numbers on his sheet can get without significant intervention by the DM. Hopefully, that'll help keep the expectations realistic.
Other than that, I guess make sure the fights have meaning so that player B can be invested in them and that player A knows that the next fight doesn't just happen, but is tied into the story being told.
Maybe more towards crafting in downtime? Throw some rumours of new weapon schematics he has to find, decepher and make. Gives hime a goal to work towards and maybe stops hime constantly asking for small stat boosts. If you time it right they find the ability to forge better weapons around the point where the game take a power spike
he just needs a good quest. Tell him about the magical sword of Plustewz and the black plate mail of Nohitzyu, but they're buried deep in the dungeon and he'll need some help to find them. these are the easiest gamers there are. He'll role play if he needs to talk to someone to find his way.
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Two players; we'll call them A and B. Both are new to TTRPGs.
Having some difficulty trying to connect with Player A. I'll try to keep things short, but I want to try to get all the context there too.
He is not a power gamer in the TTRPG traditional sense, but comes from a background of ONLY video games. As such his whole motivation in many of those games were to spend hours on end grinding to be as strong as possible and picking up all the loot he could find to equip the best stuff all the time. This shows in his approach to DnD.
Every town and every dungeon he tries to find something that's 1d12 damage and not 1d8, 1 more AC than before, 1 more STR than before, and so on. Non-numerical power is hard to parse for him; things must hit harder than before or block more than before or he isn't getting stronger.
His backstory left me with little to nothing as it was 'kicked out of his house because he spent all day training and fantasizing about weapons in his room'. He made a Fighter and the race he chose has some spell features (it's a supplement; Beast World; he picked Jackal and it comes with Eldritch Blast), but every level he has sunk into STR and DEX; no feats. He doesn't like that his Eldritch Blast is weaker than his attacks, but doesn't want to sacrifice his strength with weapons. He wants a two hand sword because it deals more damage, but doesn't want to lose the AC his shield gives him.
And he's not confrontational or demanding about it; that's the part I want to stress. In fact he's always worried about being 'too OP'. Case in point he asked me today if there were spells he could add to his weapon or turn based effects that affected time like Haste, Stop, gravity spells, etc. so it wasn't all about damage, but, as DMs know, the most powerful effects in the game are ones that adjust any form of Action Economy and so in vanilla, and many supplements, these things are limited or outright banned.
I'm just at a complete loss on how to navigate this. Player B wants social interaction, wants to explore, and wants more than just combat. Player A only values combat and every other situation is just a road to fighting things. Dialogue he'll engage with minimally and won't sabotage, but if this were a single player game dude would be skipping these parts for the next fight for sure, lol.
I tried to talk with him about his character's motivation for doing things, for adventuring, etc. to try to get an idea of how to invest him more into the world and he said plain as day his character just wants to get stronger and fight the 'final boss', lol. And this 'final boss' is in his head, because I have never hinted at, revealed, or created a BBEG for this campaign. They've been going on episodic adventure style quests up to this point (and they were informed of this at the start) and looking at their actions and successes and failures to come up with a BBEG organically if needed.
Any experience handling this or thoughts on it?
Sounds like just needing to balance potions of the game to cater to the needs for your players. Player A is a numbers guy who values combat. His character reflects that by being something of your average fighting anime protagonist. Give him something to fight and he will be happy. Give him something to chase or strive for, and he'll be happy. Player B is more story driven. Use the story and the social aspect of the game to let Player B unlock lore and fun bits that lead Player A to their goal of fighting or gathering power.
I guess the question is, if there is no big bad, what is the main thrust of your campaign? It may be that the free-form directionless feel of it all is causing some distress in Player A. They are looking for a challenge and only finding more social encounters to overcome.
I would just explain that D&D is not a video game, even though there are video games based on D&D. He doesn't have to worry about being OP. You, the DM, can balance combat as needed... and that includes some things that are so much tougher than his character could ever be that a Dark Souls boss would feel sorry for him if they were thrown in.
Ask him if he has anything specifically in mind for what his character would think of as a "final boss". Or anything in general. Would it be a dragon? Would it be a dragon that did a specific thing?
Sounds like his character is on the Goku arc. His only goal is to get stronger and fight stronger enemies so he can get stronger.
It might help to explain to him that 5e essentially has caps on how high the numbers on his sheet can get without significant intervention by the DM. Hopefully, that'll help keep the expectations realistic.
Other than that, I guess make sure the fights have meaning so that player B can be invested in them and that player A knows that the next fight doesn't just happen, but is tied into the story being told.
Maybe more towards crafting in downtime? Throw some rumours of new weapon schematics he has to find, decepher and make. Gives hime a goal to work towards and maybe stops hime constantly asking for small stat boosts. If you time it right they find the ability to forge better weapons around the point where the game take a power spike
he just needs a good quest. Tell him about the magical sword of Plustewz and the black plate mail of Nohitzyu, but they're buried deep in the dungeon and he'll need some help to find them. these are the easiest gamers there are. He'll role play if he needs to talk to someone to find his way.